


What does JT stand for?

by WhumpTown



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Hurt Malcolm Bright, Hurt/Comfort, JT cares about Malcolm, JT tells Malcolm his name, they're friends - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 07:33:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23347732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhumpTown/pseuds/WhumpTown
Summary: JT holds off telling Malcolm his name, its all fun and games until it might be too late to ever tell him
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell, Malcolm Bright & JT Tarmel
Comments: 4
Kudos: 127





	What does JT stand for?

He waited too long. 

In the beginning, it had been fun to have something that Bright couldn’t profile out of him. A name is not something written broadly across someone’s chest, to be read as easily fear in the crinkle of an eye or the nervous pluck of fatherhood. For once, JT had something Bright wanted but could not obtain. Not even Dani would cave and give Bright JT’s name. She had found the fun in it too and Malcolm found she was guarding JT’s secret with as much fever as he was.

_“I was his partner first, Bright._

And Malcolm had looked genuinely hurt but both detectives know the hurt is just in being left out of an inside joke. JT took them for coffee, rolling his eyes as Malcolm steadily supplied J names. At least the kid is smart enough to shoot them by Dani and not JT. 

But the fun is lost. Jerked from beneath their feet. 

“Bright!” 

JT’s head snaps up, eyes searching for where Dani and Malcolm had run off to. His chest seizes painfully when he sees Dani, mouth open in shock as she screams. Malcolm limp on the ground, blood pooling by his head.

She gets to him before JT does. Her sobs are the only thing louder than the bullets raining around them. “You’re okay. You’re okay.” She repeats the two words like a mantra. If she says them enough then maybe they’ll be true.

JT takes one look at their profiler and sinks to his knees. “Hold him down.”

Dani looks up at him, tears streaming down her face. “He-He needs a hospital, JT! What-What’re you…” She watches JT bend down and jerk Malcolm’s shirt open, tearing the fabric with his hands as if it’s paper. He looks up at her once, a glint in his eyes she’s never seen before, but she doesn’t dare misunderstand it either. She does as he’s asked, placing her hands on Malcolm’s shoulder.

JT cups the back of Malcolm’s neck, the other wiping blood away as fast as he can. His eyes catch the sucking black and he recognizes the wound. Dani quickly sees why JT instructed her to hold Malcolm down as JT packs the fabric into Malcolm’s neck. 

Malcolm’s eyes fly open, a choked cry falling out of his lips. He tries to twist away from JT, to push Dani off of him but his hands do no more than touch their bodies. Fingers uselessly gripping at her skin as his feet scrape the ground to push himself away. Malcolm’s fist grabs JT’s shirt, gathering the fabric on his shoulder in a twist as his chest heaves off the ground. His hips twist but Dani grabs him and pushes his hips back to the ground.

JT works wordlessly, shoving the fabric into the wound despite Malcolm’s gurgled pained moans. He can’t stop. “Estas bein,” JT whispers, his thumb finally stopping the fabric from digging further into Malcolm’s throat. “You’re okay, man. Seguro- _safe_.” He wipes the tears from Malcolm’s face, leaving a faint pink on his cheeks. 

Malcolm chokes, chest heaving. JT holds his neck a little higher, allowing Malcolm’s mouth to hang open and his windpipe to rest as open as it naturally can. The weak choking dies, leaving nothing but wheezing gurgles as Malcolm attempts to breathe around the blood he’s breathed in. “You can’t die on me.” JT holds his neck with one hand, fingers still keeping hold over the packed wound. “Dani will kill me,” JT reasons, begging with tear-filled eyes for Malcolm to keep blinking owlishly up at him. Malcolm squirms, trying to get away from the fingers digging into his flesh. Away from JT and the pain. His dress shoe scrapes against the ground, attempting to push his body, but he blinks twice in quick session and searches for JT. 

JT leans over him, tapping Malcolm’s cheek twice until the profiler drags his eyes over to JT’s. “Right here, hermano,” JT squeezes Malcolm’s hand.

“Is-Is…” Dani looks between them, eyes moving from Malcolm’s face to their joined hands. 

JT shakes his head, eyes never leaving Malcolm. “He’s _fine_.” JT’s eyes slide to the blood he’s sitting in, to the cold ashy skin of Malcolm’s neck. The profiler is losing his fight, JT can feel the slowing beat of his heart against his callused fingers. “Hey,” JT smacks his cheek, not sparing him a gentle tap. Malcolm’s cheek stings but his eyes open just a sliver more. 

He opens his pale lips, mouth forming the word tired but no sound forming. The sliver is lost as Malcolm blinks and can’t find it in him to open them back up. He can feel hands on his shoulders, cold and numb just like his body. A voice just out of reach calling his name. 

“Javier,” JT says, cupping Malcolm’s neck to face him. He can Malcolm swallow, adam’s apple bobbing. “My name is Javier Thiago Tarmel.” Malcolm doesn’t react, body limp in his friend’s grip. “Everyone calls me JT, though. My mother hates it but no one calls me Javier except Tally. On-Only when she’s mad at me.” A single tear falls from JT’s eye, slipping down his cheek.

Malcolm opens his mouth, Thiago, he thinks. Mmm, short for Santiago. He hadn’t thought of that one. 

“Come on, man.” 

Malcolm feels his neck being tilted again, allowing him to take in another shuddering breath. His lungs are heavy, throat swollen. Not much longer, Malcolm knows. He’s cold, so cold.

Something pushes between his lips, hard, and he tastes crimson as it’s pulled out. Heavy metal presses his tongue down. He gags, chest bucking as he tries to move away the tube slithering down his throat.

“Tranquilo,” JT whispers at Malcolm’s side. The medic keeps pushing the tube down, Malcolm’s body moving but not enough to stop the man. JT knows his words are lost to Malcolm but in the moment, he can feel Malcolm recognize his voice. The hand in his own tightening and Malcolm’s hips moving towards JT. Helplessly, Malcolm’s feet move on the ground pushing himself away from the medics and towards JT.

The medic places the tube, his hand moving quickly to squeeze the bag. Malcolm immediately falls limp. JT moves, gathering Malcolm’s hand back up in his own. The profilers name spilling from his lips until he sees Malcolm’s eyes fluttering back open. Blue eyes lazily move back and forth, slowly falling to his left- to JT.

“Hey man.”

\------------------

“Javier.”

Three heads jerk up, each lost in their own worlds. JT is the first to move, frowning at the weak rasp of Malcolm’s voice. His imagination must be playing tricks on him. “What’d you say, Bright?” The profiler is still hooked up to countless machines, a bag of A negative hanging above his head to replace the blood he’d lost in surgery and in the field. 

Malcolm opens his mouth but no sound comes out. 

Gil rises to his feet, slowly gathering a few chips of ice from the large pan a nurse brought in. With a single chip onto the spoon, Gil places it against Malcolm’s lips. “Here,” Gil whispers softly, his other hand pushing Malcolm’s sweaty bangs from his face. “I know your throat is sore.”

Malcolm sucks on the chip greedily, the cool melting down his throat like liquid gold. “Javier,” he repeats, his voice hardly a whisper but the frown on JT’s lips says it all. “Thiago,” Malcolm says, pushing on despite the pain in his throat. “I have to admit I wasn’t expecting Thiago.”

JT rolls his eyes, shaking his head. “Shut up,” he sighs. There’s a rush of relief in his chest, secretly. He thought Malcolm was dead, gone. It’s a… relief to hear the other man’s voice. “Get some rest, punk. Don’t want you straining yourself too much, pretty boy.”

Malcolm’s already losing his fight against the drugs, happily taking another chip when Gil places the spoon to his lips. His eyes slide shut, allowing himself to relax knowing his friends are here. “Sure thing, Javier.”


End file.
